100 drabbles
by Clouffie
Summary: 100 oneshots, some may be related to each other. Yuffentine, Clouffie, CloTi, Reefie, ReTi, VinAer and more. Requests accepted, any pairings except ocs. Names on right of title are the point of veiw I am writing from. Please come on in 3
1. 001 Beginnings, Yuffie

Hey, I'm trying to do the 100 drabbles challange. There will probably be a lot of Yuffentine and definately some mild yaoi. Please r&r, constructive criticism accepted.

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001. Beginnings.

As she watched the rain fall, Yuffie Kisaragi thought about beginnings. Every raindrop was a new beginning, washing the slate clean. Of course not everyone thought about it like that; after the rain that cured geostigma Cloud couldn't start again with Tifa – he carried on blaming himself for what happened to Aeris. And she kinda hated them both for that. Naturally she couldn't hate Aeris as much as she may have wanted to because she was practically Yuffie's sister. But she hated the way that even in death she stole Cloud away from Tifa. She hated Cloud for being in love with someone who was dead dead dead and could never come back, she hated him for being blind to Tifa's feelings.

And after Vincent had stopped Omega he hadn't been able to start a life without that cold dead bitch Lucrecia, who Yuffie hated the most because she's the one who made Vincent think he was a monster when he was actually an angel.

Watching the rain Yuffie wished that everybody could have a new beginning. Especially him.


	2. 002 Too much, Cloud

Too Much

As he lay panting in the darkness, his heart clenching and unclenching in a rapid beat he thought _this is too much._

Every night he relived his guilt. And there was so much of it. Last night it had been her. Her pink dress creasing as she knelt down, hands clasped together.

So peaceful, so beautiful.

And then, through her stomach a shaft of metal and she fell down, down mouth not quite smiling anymore, her hands reaching out and he tried to catch her, he tried but trying wasn't enough. And that mouth trickled out red, that small form leaked it out and it clashed horribly with her dress and that made him want to giggle and then that red flow was all around him, rising like the tide into hid lungs, and it was all his fault, his fault, HIS GODAMN FAULT.

He has woken up with tears leaking out of his eyes, and it reminded him of too much blood.


	3. 003 Lovers, Tifa

003 Lovers.

She couldn't remember when they had been anything but lovers. And why would she want to?

Ok, admittedly she did remember a period of friendship before they got together. And there was the faintest recollection of hate for him before Sephiroth had fallen. But now there was only them, only this, only his bright red hair spread over her sheets, only those crystal blue eyes dilated with ecstasy, only his pale lips mouthing her name. Only his fingers twined in hers as they both swallowed each others moan of release.

Half asleep, she watched those cat-like features smoothed out, smiling as his hand stayed in hers.

"Teefs?"

"Yes?"

"I love you, yo."

"I love you too Reno"

And she, and her lover, settled down to sleep.


	4. 004 Orange VincentAeris

004 orange

Orange. The colour of a Wutai sunset. Orange. The colour of my mothers eyes by starlight. Orange. The colour of my claw reflecting a candle flame.

I hate the colour orange. It is too bright, too cheery and yet violent at the same time. It has so many bad memories for me. For instance, the last time I saw Lucr- the last time I saw _her_ I could have sworn her brown eyes glint amber in the light.

That's the reason I started to love her. Others soon followed, but the first remained – she had no orange in her. Only green and brown and pink.

Green eyes don't ever look orange – not even reflecting a campfire. Her brown hair was only brown, not a hint of red or gold or the colour between. And her dress was pink and pink and orange hate each other so for a while I was safe.

But after she left, there was no more pink.

The only green was in the eyes of that thing that destroyed her.

And the only brown tinted with Orange.


	5. 005 Years, Rufus

005 years

Years passed. And a little boy changed. From a tiny toddler with a chaotic ability to mess up anything within his reach, to a smiling child who always laughed. His mother was a kind woman, smart and sweet. But the years that changed the little boy the most were the ones after she died.

He knew that his father had killed her, or ordered it. It was instinct at first, then as he learnt to listen to the whisper of the world, he knew it for certain.

And so the smiling, laughing boy died alongside his mother. He was replaced by a cold, solemn pre-teen with eyes as cold as Wutai frost, with yellow hair that was way too bright for the pale face with the sneering mouth that was always twisted to the side of his face.

The cold pre-teen melted into a frigid man, made of ice. He was the man who never cried, who never bled. He never laughed or smiled except sarcastically. He never joked, except to humiliate.

Sometimes Tseng watched him.

And when he did he blamed himself.


	6. 006 Children, Reno

006 Children

Because of the mako exposure they'd both had, they couldn't have children.

She had grown up near a reactor, and later spent a lot of time inside them to decipher their workings, and therefore their weaknesses.. She had cried when the doctor told her, years before she met him.

He had grown up in a place where the acrid stench of mako had burnt his nose, and when he was a cadet they'd injected him to test his reaction.

When he found out he'd just smiled and said "yeah, so? Think of all the money I'll save – if you know what I mean."

He said it in the lewd voice that he used, so that no-one could doubt what he meant.

Later, after they met up, hit it off and hooked up she cried when she told him. He held her hands and wouldn't look at her when he told her.

So they made do with substitutes. The little boy with wide blue eyes, a little darker than his, and brown hair a lot lighter than hers. The little girl that could almost have her eyes, but nothing of him.

But sometimes she couldn't help crying, and imagining little girls with shocking red hair, and wine coloured eyes.

And sometimes he bit his lip so it bled, when he imagined grinning, cunning boys with aquamarine eyes and brown-black hair.

Then she'd reach for his hand, and he for hers.


	7. 007 Shapes, Yuffie

007 Shapes

If everybody was a shape, I'd be the most awesome, fantastical star shape. Cause ninja's have ninja stars, geddit? I kill myself, I do. But not in the icky suicide way.

Other people? Hum.

Vinnie would totally be a figure of eight. Cause he's gonna live forever y'know? And sometimes when he talks he just goes on and on and on – "blah blah Lucrecia blah sin blah angst blah Lucrecia." Get my drift? As much as I love the guy, get over it!

Let me seeeeee. Reeve would be a triangle. Cause of that little beard he has. I know its in an exact triangle, cause I measured it once. He was asleep, the almightily hard working Reeve-bot was asleep! I know!

What I didn't know, before then, was that he looks kinda, almost, sorta, cute when he sleeps. He smiles, and his lips quirk up _just so _and he actually has really long eyelashes, which are the same chocolate-y brown black as his triangle beard and his hair.

And when I was measuring, I thought 'What the heck' and I kinda, sorta kissed him. Come on! That man is gorgeous! And he kinda sorta kissed back.

So now we are the epic duo stargirl and the trianglasized wonder!

I always liked triangles best.

My first attempt at Yuffie p.o.v, how was it? I hated the beginning, but I want YOUR points to audience thoughts. Hope the Reefie fans, and Leonora enjoy xxx.


	8. 008 Sixth sense, Vincent

008 Sixth Sense.

Vincent had always had a sort of sixth sense. He got this biting, nagging feeling that something was wrong, and it wouldn't stop until he found out what. It had helped him when he was a Turk, and it helped him still.

That's how he found out when Cloud had…snapped. Vincent supposed it was inevitable. For all the man was, or rather had been, a hero he was not immune to himself. After the battle with Sephiroth and then his clones, Cloud had become more inverted. If they couldn't come back why couldn't she?

That's when Vincent first began feeling worried. When Tifa started appearing with various bruises along her jaw.

She said it was from sparring.

He didn't believe her.

Then, one night he heard Cloud's voice. "Why couldn't YOU HAVE DIED INSTEAD OF HER? EH? She was beautiful, pure…. And you are worthless" Vincent heard a thud, and as he stayed hidden in the shadows he saw Cloud come tearing out of the entrance of the bar. A little while later Tifa stumbled out, a fresh bruise on her cheek.

Cloud's body was found at the forbidden forest, a bullet through his back.

Vincent never felt sorry for what he had done. Cloud, the real Cloud, would have done the same. His sixth sense told him so.

Pagebreak xxxxxla

Inspired by this video; www (dot) youtube(dot) com/watch?vGh5U2oaGc3M

Just put . without spaces instead o f(dot)


	9. 009 Lightning, Yuffie

009 Lightening.

The first thing Yuffie noticed was that the desk was unmanned. The second thing she noticed was that she was wrong; if you listened carefully enough you could hear the occasional whine or whimper from underneath it. She thought it might be a wounded animal, so she got on her hands and knees and crawled under the counter. But there was no little animal in sight – just a terrified Turk.

His hands were clamped over his ears and his eyes were closed, but she could see the tears that were escaping from his lids.

At first she had no idea what was wrong, and then as she thought about it she noticed that every time the lightning forked outside the windows, he gave a little cry. It was so bright; she thought he must be able to see it through his eyelids.

Slowly she inched forward and put her arms around him. He stiffened and one bright blue eye opened warily, before closing as he snuggled into her embrace.

"Not one word to anyone, yo"

Yuffie smiled

"Only if you don't tell anyone I'm scared of trees"

"Deal."

A pause

"TREES?"


	10. 010 Taste, Elena

010 taste

Taste, Elena discovered, was her favourite sense. Getting up in the morning with the taste of good coffee in her mouth. Walking to work delicately licking the icing of a doughnut. The tang of a good fruit smoothie.

But her favourite, favourite taste of all was a subtle one. It tasted of red wine, of snow and very faintly of blood.

As Rufus pulled away from her mouth to work his way down her neck she smiled giddily and wondered what she tasted like.

Xxxx break xxxx

For Nathalie335


	11. 011 Blue, Cloud

011 Blue

My favourite colour? Well it's not purple or green or orange like I've told people in the past. I'll tell you a secret. It's blue!

You may not think it is a big secret, but it totally is. Because I know someone with blue eyes. The colour of trust, of honour and sadness. That is the colour blue to me.

And the person with blue eyes isn't as trusting as he used to be, but the point is that he used to be. And he is honourable. And he is always sad.

Whenever he comes down the stairs I can see from his eyes that he has been dreaming about them. And I think he was in love with him, Zack.

So I moan and whine at him to make him happy. And sometimes those blue eyes actually smile, and I fall off my seat with happiness.

Slowly, slowly my ninja-riffic cheering up skills are making him less sad, and more trusting. So he is my cloudy blue sky.

Xoxoxoxoxooxxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxooxoxoxoxoxoxoxooxoxoxox

For Darkened-Skys


	12. 012 Insides, Tseng

012 insides

Her insides, Tseng thought, were beautiful. Once when they were on a mission someone had cut her open, shoulder to hip. He had had to hold her intestines inside her until help came. With his hands deep inside her entrails, he watched mesmerised as the pink and red organs pulsed and twitched through their routines.

And he had loved it. He had felt the beat of her body as she lay there, flowing around his fingers.

Later, when she was healed, he had discovered other beautiful bits of her insides. The inside of her mouth, warm pink and delicate. Those smooth teeth, that catlike tongue. It drove him crazy. But, without a doubt his favourite insides of her was down below in that heated, heaving tightness.

He would always remember her as the beautiful blonde, with the beautiful insides.

Xxxx

Tseng/Elena. Kinda twisted but I really liked it. .


	13. 013 Sound, Yuffie

013 Sound.

Have you ever woken up one morning and found your voice just gone? That's what happened when I swung my feet into my uber fluffyness bunnyful slippers. Instead of my clear voice belling out a good morning to all, there were a series of horrible, harsh raven like caws. After three or four attempts I gave up. Silently I grabbed my shuriken and swung out of the window. Without my voice I couldn't face my friends. I knew that Cid or Barret would laugh at me, and then Tifa would smile and Cloud would smirk. But this is one thing I cannot let anyone laugh at. My voice is my weakness. Without it I'm just a pathetic little thing with no oomph. If I can't speak then I'm nothing at all.

Here's a secret. When I was little Godo used to lock me in my room. Every night for five years I screamed my voice out and he never came. I guess that's one reason why we don't get along.

So without my voice, I'm worthless. Just something to be locked away, thrown away.


	14. 014 Star, Cloud

014 Star

Cloud stared at the sky. Looking, looking for him. Aeris once told Cloud that she believed everyone returned to the stars. If this was true then he swore that Zack would be the one that blazed brighter. Because Zack shone brighter than anybody Cloud had ever known.

He remembered their first kiss. Cloud had been leaning back in his chair, tired from work. All of a sudden he felt Zack straddle his lap. "Hey superstar" he had whispered, before leaning forward and dipping his tongue into Cloud's mouth. He had been drunk at the time, but it had somehow lead to a relationship.

He remembered their first time. Heated movement under silk sheets, the friction of skin on skin. Moans dragged from each others lips.

Afterwards they lay together and Cloud had seen a solitary star out of the high window.

Now, lying with his back braced against Zack's old buster sword he began to sing in a soft voice.

"You are my starshine, my only starshine. You light up the sky when it is black I've told you how much I love you, come home dear just come back." Zack had sung that modified lullaby to him a few times.

Cloud smiled as he saw a violet star twinkling bright. He had found Zack again. Even if it was just for one last night.


	15. 015 Touch, Yuffie

015 Touch

(Related to drabble 013: Sound)

After a few weeks my voice still hadn't come back. My phs batteries were almost full since I couldn't answer the messages people left.

Beep. "Yuffie what's wrong? It's Tifa. We are all very worried about you." Message received February 3rd from Boobs. Delete y/n? Deleted.

Beep. "Yuffie, come home now or answer the calls. Tifa is worried. Did we offend you? We'll talk when you get home." Message received February 25th from Cloud Strife. Delete y/n? Deleted.

"Brat, its Cid. Get your &!! Ass back here; it's too quiet." Message received March 12th from Old man Highwind. Delete y/n? Deleted.

The days went by and I spent them training. I barely know who I am, or where I am and I have no idea where I'm travelling to.

As I tucked myself into my sleeping bag, in the cave I was sleeping in, I turned on my phs to check the messages. One new message. Flashed across the screen. I pressed play. "Yuffie it is me. I am coming to find you." Message received April 21st from Vinnie! Delete y/n? Saved.

No longer sleepy I jerked upwards, mentally swearing. If Vincent was coming after me then I had to find somewhere as isolated as hell to hide. I didn't want to go back, and there was no way I could call anyway, the obvious voice thing aside I just wouldn't know what to say. "Hey I've been avoiding you for two or three months because I have no voice?" I don't think so.

I packed up and started fleeing him. I went everywhere; it felt like, Gonaga, Kalm and even Bone village. In Gonaga I caught a glimpse of his cloak as he crossed the street in front of me, thankfully not looking back. In Kalm he stalked in to the bar I was hiding in, not noticing me in my new blonde wig and tanned skin from so much training in the sun. In Bone village we passed each other, but in my fabby sunglasses and wig, turned away he didn't give me another glance.

Eventually I went to the place that would hurt him the most if he followed me. Shinra manor, Nibelheim. 

I spent weeks sleeping in old mako tanks in old dusty rooms. It creeped the hell out of me that Hojo's experiments had been where I was, but what could I do? Nothing, not even escape it seemed as my luck ran out. 

One minute I was sleeping silently the next I was being hauled upright with a gold gauntlet digging into my shoulder. I stared into crimson eyes. "Hello Yuffie." Shit. 

I glared at him and moved to grab my stuff, to see if he'd let me leave. I was pulled back. "Yuffie, do you have any idea how much you've worried everyone? How scared they were that something had happened to you?" bitterly I noted he said 'they' not 'we'. Of course the Great Vincent Valentine doesn't care about anyone who hasn't practically killed him and is dead. Harsh, but true. 

I nodded and pointed to the phs on my belt. "Than why haven't you answered?" Vincent's lips drew back in an unpleasant sneer "Was this just another stupid attention seeking stunt?" My eyes opened wide, shocked. Forgetting my current vocal situation I snapped out what would have been "Maybe you and Cloud aren't the only ones who can skulk off for months without a word, a message." But my secret was out. Instead of words, out of my mouth came a harsh snarling noise, making me sound like a crow or an angry dog. Vincent blinked and his mouth un-sneered. "Yuffie, you've lost your voice?" I nodded miserably and looked at the floor.

Vincent came closer, raising my chin with his gauntlet. "is that why you've been avoiding everyone?" he asked. I nodded, looking up into his eyes. He chuckled and my jaw dropped. He was laughing at this? My one weakness, my flaw? My pain? Didn't he understand that that was like me laughing at Lucrecia's fate? Evidently not. I reached up my hand and slapped him hard across the mouth. He stood there, shocked, and I grabbed my stuff and ran ran ran into the sunrise. The only human touch for months, and it was slapping a close friend. 

But I'd rather hit, or be hit then never be touched at all.


	16. 016 Sight, Yuffie

016 Sight

(Related to 13 and 15)

In the darkest, dingiest corner of Hojo's lab I cowered, crying and shaking. I can't believe he laughed! Vincent of all people should know when someone is in pain, when something is so wrong that it eats away your mind. For Da Chao's sake he spent fifty years in a coffin because of something he didn't do, or didn't really influence. If anyone should be laughing it should be me me me! I mean Lucrecia was such a joke. Well a bitch, a monster. 

I was still shaking, making these awful little choking noises as I sobbed, not being able to really scream anything. I wanted to curse him, damn him and his bitch to oblivion. What did I care anymore?

I didn't. Well ok I did I did. But I wish I didn't.

"Yuffie" Shit, why couldn't he leave me alone? I was crying so hard I couldn't see and here he was trying to talk to me. Was the slap too subtle? Should I try to cut him up with my shuriken? Entertaining thought, but no. He'd eat me alive.

I clamped my hands over my ears and shrunk into myself, to try and block him out, my eyes wide shut.

Next thing I knew I felt myself being pulled backwards, my back on the ground. But I kept my hands over my ears and my eyelids stopping my sight. But he pried my arms away with one hand and I opened my eyes, which looked up all of three inches to find his there. His face shortened the distance until his lips met mine. 

"Yuffie, I'm sorry. I didn't realise that this meant so much to you." He murmured as he drew back. "Forgive me?" His black hair created a curtain around our faces and I could feel his cloak on my legs. I looked up at him and nodded. And then kissed him.

Yah, I know, I know sex on a lab floor, tacky or what? But hey, I got my voice back in the middle wink wink nudge nudge. And a naked Vincent is the best damn sight a girl could want to see. But he is mine mine mine. Hah.


	17. 017 Choices, Rufus

Better off dead than giving in.

That was what Rufus Shinra believed anyway. If you gave in once, you would give in twice and thrice and countless times. And then what would you be? A doormat for people to use whenever they wished. You had to choose to be strong, chose to never relent. Or you would end up the weakest of the weak.

So he chose to never give in. But he didn't mind making others give in. What did the world need weak people for? Nothing so Gaia shouldn't give a damn if he used those that let themselves be used.

But Rufus suspected Gaia would be angry with the latest person he had used.

She had come to him with soft words on softer lips; "let my people go. Stop chasing them, please?" she asked. Rufus didn't give in, but he let her believe that a bargain would suffice. It was her own choice to believe him.

So she kept quiet while he fed off that belief, off those soft lips. Only the smallest gasp of fear when her pink dress hit the ground.

Afterwards, while she was bleeding uncontrollably, he carried out his decision. He picked up the phone to Tseng's office. Pausing he said to her "get out. You have ten minutes to leave before the Turks hunt you down." He saw the hurt and hatred in her eyes at his casual betrayal.

But it had been her own choice to believe him, Rufus reminded himself, and he was notorious for lying.

It didn't cancel out the look in her eyes though.

--

A/n I'm back! Summer holiday now so plenty of time for writing. Please ask for drabble pairings and what you would like to see, as I want to write every angle.

xoxoxo Clouffie.


	18. 018 Smell, Yuffie

When she pressed her face up against his jacket she could smell cigarettes and engine grease

When she pressed her face up against his jacket she could smell cigarettes and engine grease. Not that she disliked it; it was strange, slightly bitter and unsubtle like he was.

Unsubtle, like the first time he had seen her naked. She had been in the bath at Tifa's house, using about half of Tifa's strawberry scented bath salts, just laying back and relaxing. Then he had come thundering in. He had taken a few steps towards the toilet before he noticed her goggling at him. "Damn kid, you've actually got a rack. Who knew?" He had said, before slamming back out to use a different toilet.

She had sat there, mouth open to her 'rack' for a while, before getting out and drying off. Hurrying down the stairs she had run into him, quite hard, and gotten a face full of his jacket. Her first whiff had overwhelmed her nose and she pushed herself off, complaining. "Geeze old man take a bath once in a while would you? You _reek_" He leaned down into her hair and whispered in her ear "You smell like happiness"

Later she demanded to know what happiness smelt like and he called her a punk and walked away. Yuffie realised that the grumpy old pilot was actually embarrassed.

Slightly bitter like their first kiss. She had tripped over an engine he was working on and landed flat on top of him, their faces close. So he swore loudly, and then pulled her into a rough kiss that tasted of nicotine, tea and faintly of vinegar. She kissed him back hard, bitter mouth and all. This close to his face she could small his soap; a harsh sterile smell that was just part of him so she loved it instantly. (Sometimes when he was away she would sleep with a bar of it under her pillow)

Strange like the reaction they had got from everyone else when they announced their relation ship, already a few months old before they told anyone. Cloud had been gob-smacked and was slightly angry for being kept in the dark. Yuffie teasingly asked whether he had a crush on Cid, and he shut up damn fast.

Everyone reacted a little differently; Barrett and Cloud with anger, Vincent with a noncommittal grunt, Marlene with delight.

Tifa announced that she was getting engaged to Reno. Yuffie was thrilled and bounced over to hug the smiling woman, revelling in the smell of fruity cocktails that permanently hung around the other woman. She didn't mind a whit that she had just been upstaged; she was just happy that she could give Tifa a good opportunity to confess she and her long time Turk lover had made it formal.

Before the wedding she stole Cid's tuxedo jacket so that the familiar scent of grease and tobacco on his old jacket would be near her at all times. Although Cid had looked a little strange with it on over his formal wear Yuffie smiled as she clung to him.

Now she knew what her happiness smelt like.

--

--

Dedicated to The Sacred and Profane (the ReTi bit) and also to **S**orceress **F**ujin because she wanted a Cid/Yuffie fic.


	19. 019 Passing, Yuffie

Passing

All there was, was the wind rushing against her skull, her hair whipping so harshly across her face that it almost drew blood. And a deep, deep ache where she was sure her heart should be.

_(A long blade pushing through her chest, like some twisted fantasy)_

She had been taught to fight, fight, _fight_ and to stand her ground and to take the pain. But she can't fight this. If there was a physical manifestation of this then she sure as hell would.

_(Fleetingly she wondered if this is what Vinnie, Vince, Valentino felt all the time.)_

If she couldn't fight then she would choose the other age old option; flight. Yuffie really wished she could fly so she could get her back. The perfect, kind woman who was motherly and sweet, even to a bratty little ninja kid. The woman who had held their ragged little group together.

_(Yuffie tried not to think about how she had tried to find her dead mother in Aeris_)

They had both been beautiful in different ways. Aeris was sweet and her mother was exotic and pure Wutai in her manner. But beauty never saved them; they both died falling to the floor, eyes closed before they hit with a small sickening thunk.

_(Falling forward elegantly, eyes closed. Whether the woman was Wutainese or from the Continent, Yuffie couldn't see, couldn't distinguish. She didn't know whether it was short black hair or long brown. A silk kimono, a pink dress. They had both died gracefully. But still they had died.)_

Yuffie kicked off the ground savagely as she thought about the two nicest most brilliant women in the world, who were dead forever and ever and _(say amen to Leviathan )._

_(Falling forward elegantly, eyes closed. Whether the woman was Wutainese or from the Continent, Yuffie couldn't see, couldn't distinguish. She didn't know whether it was short black hair or long brown. A silk kimono, a pink dress. They had both died gracefully.)_

Without Aeris, Yuffie thought, everyone began to float off. Alone. Disconnected. Hope had been slow and hard to come by after her mother's passing, now it was barely alive with Aeris' end.

Yuffie ran on.


	20. 020 Why? Yuffie

He comes, they come, he leaves

He comes, they come, and he leaves.

Rinse and repeat.

She is always there; always ready to drop things in a second for him. She doesn't even know why. Surely it can't be love because love is sweet and soft and open and neither of them are any of those things.

She is bitter because of a war that killed her empire, hard because her own damn father didn't want her so she had to survive on her own and she is the opposite of open. She talks but she never really says anything because she knows that words are as cheap as any whore.

He is bitter because he tastes faintly of mako; there is too much of it in his blood and _Leviathan _it is sour. He is hard because he still trains every day, every muscle is highly defined and it is difficult to find a soft spot anywhere on his body. He is so closed up that his mouth might as well be sewn together.

Maybe it's the high she gets from it. The secrecy, the adrenaline rush of doing what you absolutely mustn't do and doing it anyway. Maybe it is because he is just the most attractive person she has ever seen and the only one who has wanted _her_. The silly, short, boyish, bratish, brash ninja punk that nobody likes enough to give another glance.

Maybe is because she knows that it is only temporary. She'll never be able to giggle with him, jump on his back and demand a piggyback or feed him sugary sweetmeats. But that's ok. Because, Yuffie finds, she isn't a child anymore. Oh, of course, she acts it whenever anyone but him is around, but more and more what she wants is to scream with him, jump in his lap and demand yet another uncomplicated fuck and feed him the most intimate parts of herself.

She doesn't know what he is doing back here again, and frankly she doesn't care. He isn't hurting anyone (except her when she asks for it, his large hands digging into her tiny wrists as she gasps and wriggles)

He's always out in the wilderness somewhere so when she goes looking she can find him in a few days at most.

She always goes back to Midgar with bruises smeared along her pale skin like a smudge of paint that goes to the bone.

Dedicated to whoever (I lost the page sorry) asked for a Yuffieroth long long ago *cry* sorry it took so long


	21. 21, Broken Tifa

The loss of someone leaves her rigid and hardly breathing. Words are bouncing through the air again and again but they make barely more sense than they did the first time she heard them. Her eyes rest on the threadbare but comfortable bed in the corner.

"He was too young"

They rove towards the stained bandage lying on the bedside table, the only visible sign of decay and disease that churns beneath the cities stew pot lid.

"…got to his brain"

Vaguely she notices the blackness from the stain on the bandage begins to ooze onto the wooden table. She must clean that up, she thought dully as she watched the seepage spread. So ignoring the words she pulled a rag out of her belt, walked over and began to methodically clean the stain, with the ease of years spent practising the same motion over and over and over. Her muscles are used to it, but after a long day of work they ache slightly. The pain is welcome.

"Very quickly, I'm afraid"

She finally understood Cloud and Vincent. Until now she thought penance and atonement were flat paper words written in a fading grey ink. They had been ways to mope, self indulgent and childish ways of grasping onto what was unstoppable, unreturnable. Now, however she saw them for what they were. A hindsight honour, pain and grief roaring over what damn well could have been finished before it had begun. Penance was the art of receiving forgiveness from the dead. The dead that, unlike Aeris, remained untalkable to. Their white faces stern and unforgiving forever and ever and yet still you try.

"Not much of a chance"

The beauty of it is the unattainability of it, knowing that you can't make it up, that you screwed up and it will be written somewhere, your sins for everyone to see. And of course such heinous sins should not be private, blame was another beauteous facet of atonement.

"nothing you could do"

Idiots, idiots. Of course there was. She could have done anything. She could have walked up the stairs and not seen his frosty pale skin fail to move. She could have seen a wry grin on his face, heard a laugh. She could have made it so that it all went away – the decay of disease. She could have prayed, have asked the cetra for help. Surely for her part in saving the planet she was owed something.

"At least he was in no pain"

Owed a life?

"All we could do"

But the planet didn't work that way, she thinks bitterly. No amount of goodness could bring back the dead. Resurrection was unimportant. A small girl stood in the doorway, crying and clenching her fists. A girl who was owed a mother, a girl who was owed a childhood and forced to grow up amongst the fog of second hand smoke, the clink of glasses and the leers of strange men. Somewhere a blond man sat, owed a friend, owed a girl and owed a hero. Unfulfilled.

In a dingy bar in Edge four people in blue suits were owed their innocence, and a clean slate free from distrust. Denied. And so many more. A caped man owed a woman and fifty years of his life. A princess owed her freedom, a captain owed an airship, a leader owed an arm. A creature owed his family. A SOLDIER owed his sanity. A best friend owed his breath.

A flowergirl owed her life.

But the world does not repay its debt to us, merely taxes us further until we are drained to the marrow. A small boy lay curled on a yellow and orange bed, owed seventy more years. Not granted.

And still the planet turned.

"Denzel?"


End file.
